So we got there on that rainy Tuesday..it took us forever to find the flat, I remember that. I'm not gonna try to write about 8 amazing days with him in Paris, because there wouldn't be enough paper in the world (and it's not like I remember every second of it either), although what I do remember certainly is our new years, but since he is by far a better writer than I am (at least in English) I am just going to "copy-paste" what he wrote, so that there is also a little memory of our trip in my blog.
"Waking up in a warm haze surrounded by classical music by Strauss (apparently Klea's favorite thing to do on New Year's Day) I'm reminded of how the year was officially begun. Only a few hours ago the haze had less to do with total exhaustion, wine and a particularly artful xxx session and more to do with immense crowds of people, nature's temper and the nicest Muslim guy you will ever see puff a cigar.We'd left with our hopes high and a milk bottle full of dark cocoa, honey, milk, and Bailey's for a bit of warmth. As soon as I saw the massive amounts of people I begin to lose faith in being able to make it to the tower.It was about 11:05 Chalk it up to a good dose of New York New Year's pessimism and simple underrating of the size of the dammed Eiffel Tower. The French government had the amazing foresig-
Pause. My girlfriend refuses to wash any dishes at all anymore because it makes her feel like a maid. Understandble? Sure. Frustrating? You bet your ass.
ht to let the Parisian metro system be free for use all night, unfortunately they did not have the foresight ( or technology, if I wanted to be fair. . .but I don't) to expand the tube. The end result being subway cars packed so full of people that you'd see a couple men and women tumble out of the doors when they opened, not to mention children who were being grasped so tight by their parents they were in pain. I almost said something about that once or twice, but I figured it was better than them getting lost. Plus I suck at speaking French.
So here I stood on the eve of this new year crammed into a subway car with too many people, one of whom was a bit too drunk, a bit too red-eyed and a little too eager to talk to Klea ( Go figure the creepy ones speak English) I shut him up by simply being the nicest cockblock on the planet, it's the best way to make males lose hope and interest, trust me. She stood there looking something like Norma Desmond in her prime, complete with spiraled , black tights, huge heeled boots (which made her exactly my height. . .if not taller), scarf and small hooded whatever. You know, old-school beautiful. But she preferred to think of herself as looking like some woman from the Lord of the Rings movies. Yeah. . .I wasn't sure exactly how to re-act either. But the point is that my beautiful baby from Barcelona had somehow used the trickery and deception of makeup to make herself look like a lovely woman of 30 while my recent decision to shave made me look like a lightly-lisping, long-jawed boy of 15. She compared it to Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher. Awesome.
The metro directly to the Tower was actually shutdown, so we riverran through the crowd as soon as I found out, getting off two stops sooner, trying to hold each others hands, but quickly realizing that our crowd skimming styles were too different. After making our way out of labyrinth that was the body heated sweat warmth of the metro's exit path we surfaced at L'Arc du Triumph and paused to allow Klea to change from her heel-boots to sneakers.It was about 11:17 We were going to be doing a bit of running. It was around this time I realized that my camcorder only had about 17min of film left. Frantically we searched of the Tower but Paris had decided to be mysterious that night and had covered the entire sky with a light purple grey fog making it impossible to fin- oh wait. A huge fucking pillar of light. Klea, it's that way. We run.
Actually, swimming would be a better word for the movements we made as we pushed our way down down various backstreets and construction zones, often losing sight of each other but after a quick explanation of east coast city-weaving versus her own Barcelona strut and I brief reprise of "We're off to see the Wizard" ( a tradition started in Berlin) we went our separate currents and took off. Amid the drunken shouts and muslim cheers one could hear a girls voice singing the song from Jules et Jim while a strange, erie whistling accompanied her, sometimes with tuba ( a tradition started in Amsterdam). This was how we knew we hadn't lost each other. We finally made it, not to the base of the Tower like I had pictured, but to where she had wanted to go all along, Le Sacre Coeur. And no, I have no idea of it's significance. But she was right, as always, the view was amazing. 11:34.
But as always, she had a hard time listening, and as I spied I spot on the statue atop the courtyard, she refused to follow, convinced she could wiggle her way through the seated crowd on the step to the front. I finally convinced her to follow me and we tried to work our way around the green carving. But in the time that it took to get there, someone jacked our spot. Klea attempted to haggle the men seated their into relinquishing us some space, I figured it was a lost cau-
Pause: I've been requested to sit and 'watch' the final two compositions in the New Years' Day Concert. They're her favorite. And yes, they're by Strauss. Admittedly. . .the last one was pretty cool. The conductor had the audience clap half the percussion.
se and looked for somewhere else. I quickly found a spot to the left and signaled to her that I'd found a better place. As I started my way over she stomped her foot and shouted, " I'm NOT following you!". Stubborn. Everyone turned to look as I did what I usually did in these situations and continued to my spot. Eventually she relinquished and we hopped over a prickly bush onto a small fountain ledge between a young German couple and the aforementioned Muslim husband and wife duo. As we sat they offered us chocolate and we sat down to enjoy the view and we offered them some of our Special Hot Chocolate and they, of course said no, and we sat down again, but this time for good and enjoyed the view. As the clock neared 12 I whipped out my camcorder and tried to be clever with my narration.
Dis. Kisses. Chocolate. Sept. Warmth. Sparklers. Quarte. Yelling. Counting. Tower. Colors. Deux. Kisses. Light. Zero.
and as the Eiffel Tower exploded into millions of small lights there was no large bang or incredible firework display or crowd roaring or big display. Only laughter and kissing and light fog. Somewhere behind us was the sound of champagne popping. Klea says that the Tower would continue to sparkle for the rest of the night. After taking some pictures and being silly in general, we decide the cold is cold and we'd rather be warm. We head back home.
Minor quibbles on the way back are all forgotten as the door closes and the candles are lit and the bathwater runs aroma lifts and the bread is warm and the cheese is spread and the wine is drank and the conversation dissolves and the mind races and the love is made and the muscles are working and the voice is sighing and the sensation is coming and the tiredness settles and sleep begins to peek around the corner.
Somewhere outside the Eiffel Tower has returned to it's famous golden glow."
So there it is, him and his amazing talent to put down on a paper (in this case a computer) every one of our moves. This is for those ones that are curious enough about my life so that they spend the whole afternoon reading about it. Re-read it. It's worth it.
